There should 47 Presidents involved in the virtual fest. But Mali’s Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta who was deposed in a military coup last week, remains in detention.

The WHO’s Africa region doesn’t include North Africa. However, there has not been a case of wild polio there  since  2004 so WHO Africa director Matshidiso Moeti correctly declares the entire continent free of the disease that used to paralyze 75 000 children a year.

That leaves only Afghanistan and Pakistan as the only countries on the the planet still reporting polio cases.

Vaccines are very much front and centre of public consciousness with the race to find one against COVID 19.

The politicians are taking the lead in this battle with Donald Trump maintaining a COVID 19 vaccine could still arrive in time for the November 3 U.S. Presidential election he is desperate to win.

Both China and Russia maintain they have actually produced a vaccine but there is no rush by the public to avail themselves of such poorly tested measures.

The scientists  maintain that COVID 19 will be with us for some time, even after a reliable vaccine is produced.

So far in medical history, smallpox is the only infectious disease to have been eradicated by vaccine. That was 40 years ago.

Rinderpest, spread among animals, is the other.

The World Health Organization lists 17 vaccines against dangerous and deadly diseases.

The polio eradication efforts led by Gates and Dangote began almost three decades ago and failed to meet its millennium target.

A 2003 boycott of the vaccination programme in Nigeria led to the disease spreading to 20 other countries in the next five years.

The eradication programme looked like it had succeeded in 2015 but four new cases were reported in 2016.

The Nigerian problem was focused on Borno State where the Islamist terror group Boko Haram prevented medical access to the population.

The authorities used the army to back up vaccination teams that used guerrilla tactics to get their job done.

They moved into areas made safe, even for a few days, and vaccinated children accompanying their parents to markets.

The children immunized in this way passed this on to their peers through drinking water.

Unfortunately some of the vaccine viruses muted and spread to villages where immunization was not total.

That strain is much less virulent – one in 200 cases results in paralysis.

In 2018, 68 children were infected. This number increased to 320 last year.

The WHO fears that this number may increase because of the COVID 19 lockdown preventing access by polio vaccination teams.

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The operation in Nigeria’s north western state of Zamfra bordering on Niger also recovered five abductees captured for ransom by the bandits.

Nigerian military spokesman General John Enenchie says the five hostages and hundreds of cattle will be formally returned to families and owners.

He says a number of rifles were also taken from the rustlers.

Kidnapping and cattle rustling are a persistent problem in Zamfra and the neighboring state of Kaduna.

Locals have formed vigilante groups to beat off the bandits.

The area is plagued by attacks from Boko Haram jihadists who move freely across the border into Niger.

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The groups is calling this revenge for the October killing in Syria of its leader and spokesperson .

The 56-second piece of footage released by the so-called ISIS news agency Amaq does not give the names of the 11 victims.

They are believed to be men captured in  Nigeria’s north-eastern Borno State in recent weeks.

The timing coincides with Christmas the most important Christian festival.

The Nigerian government has not been able to contain the Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram operating in the north east of the country which has substantial ties with other jihadi extremist militant groups like ISIS.

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A massive campaign in the north of the country appears to have beaten Boko Haram’s efforts to stop vaccination against this painful wasting disease.

Nigeria, Afghanistan and Pakistan are the three countries on earth where polio still exists.

If there is not another case recorded in Kanu State in the next fortnight, Nigeria will come off that list and Africa will be polio free.

Boko Haram has used a combination of intimidation and misinformation to stop the vaccination campaign, leaving 66 000 children in northern villages vulnerable.

Authorities, using soldiers and volunteers, have  toured these villages to counter false claims that vaccination causes impotence and is a Christian plot against the Muslim community.

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The militants then attacked a military base but were driven off.

Responsibility for the attack in Borno state is being claimed by group that styles itself Islamic State West African Province which is active in north-eastern Nigeria and is commonly known as Boko Haram.

The terrorists were in seven bakkies fitted with mounted heavy machine guns known as technicals.

After their ambush, they attacked a military base near Jakana.

Troops there managed to repel them. 

The militants fled, leaving behind weapons and one of the vehicles.

The Nigerian Government insists it has the measure of the terror group, forcing it abandon plans to establish a caliphate in northern Nigeria. 

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Malam Adamu Adamu says criminalizing the parents of stay-at-home children is an effective way of forcing them to have their offspring educated.

The United Nations Children’s Fund says Nigeria has one of the highest rates of children out of school.

Two thirds of the more than ten-and-a-half million not registered for school live in northern parts of  Nigeria threatened by the Boko Haram Islamist insurgents.

In other areas, poor parents keep their children out of school to send them to work.

Only 61 percent of children between six and eleven years old are regularly in class.

Education Minister Malam Adamu Adamu says this is undermining Nigeria’s education system. 

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Voting had to be extended last night in areas where polls opened late or voting was disrupted by ballot machine malfunctioning.

President Muhammadu Buhari, seeking a second term, says he’s confident of victory in Africa’s largest election to date.

Equally buoyant  is former vice president Atiku Abubaker in a contest that’s too close to call.

The election, which was a week late because of organizational problems, was marred by violence in the north east and south of the country.

Authorities, who initially denied it, admit that Islamist terror group Boko Haram fired artillery shells into Maiduguri in an unsuccessful bid to seize the Borno state capital. 

One soldier was killed 

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There were shots fired in the north east and south of the continent’s most populous country where the result is too close to call.

Both Muhammadu Buhari, vying for a second term as Nigeria’s president, and Atiku Abubaker his main opponent for the position, cast their ballots early today.

The polls stayed open for just six hours.

Security force said the shots heard in Maiduguri, where terrorist group Boko Haram has threatened would-be voters, were simply a drill.

There was no explanation for why the gunfire rang through the southern city of Port Harcourt.

Voting was delayed for several hours in a number of centers.

The election had been posponed for a week because of organizational problems.

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Having shunned South African and other offers of help, the independent electoral commission is under pressure to deliver on the second time of asking.

Security is a red button issue for the 84 million registered Nigerian voters.

They need to feel safe going to the polls to tomorrow.

And the authorities are painfully aware that if they want to convince people their long-term safety is being safeguard the best way of starting is by securing a safe election.

Fighting for a second term, Muhammadu Buhari has several times boasted that his forces have beaten Boko Haram’s insurgency in north east Nigeria.

Yet the Islamist terrorists have consistently mounted attacks on civilians.

The threat of their presence is the biggest deterrent to voters in this part of the country bordering Chad and Niger.

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Amnesty International and global media outlets have shown footage of Cameroonian soldiers shooting and killing  civilians, including women with children strapped to their backs.

Cameroon’s a key security partner of the United States.

300 US marines are training Cameroonian troops fighting Boko Haram coming into the north of the country from neighboring Nigeria.

But Cameroon’s English-speaking minority claims it’s being marginalized and radical elements within this group are  seeking to secede.

In parts of the southwest, security experts say the country is close to civil war.

Washington’s saying it will not condone executions, attacks on civilians and burning villages 

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